


Geography of a Former Magician

by Songofstorms3



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Angst, M/M, Songfic, Trauma, afraid of intimacy, gay longing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 16:47:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23150425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Songofstorms3/pseuds/Songofstorms3
Summary: Simon struggles to be intimate with Baz after the trauma of losing his magic.
Relationships: Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Comments: 4
Kudos: 35





	Geography of a Former Magician

**Author's Note:**

> A songfic exploring Simon's fears of intimacy with Baz after losing his magic. Includes events from Wayward Son.  
> The song lyrics in italics are from Pearl by Mitski.

_You're growing tired of me  
You love me so hard and I still can't sleep  
You're growing tired of me  
And all the things I don't talk about_

It was easier. When the magic was still inside. It was overwhelming, rippling through me, waiting for the moment of release. When the Mage pointed me in the direction of the danger, and that moment of complete release, relief tinged with shame. It’s so much. But it had a reason, a purpose. I could be the one to take them down, this much power, this much want, the Mage wants it. He wants me. I wasn’t enough though, in the end. He wanted it all, wanted me to give it to him in that moment of bright lights and shattered glass. I couldn’t do it. I knew it would hurt him, if he knew how much was inside me. It was always safer to let it build to bursting and run into the mission. I’m a bomb. But I’m useful, that’s something, isn’t it?

The Humdrum’s words float back to me in moments I’m in Baz’s arms. Happy and warm, my fingers trailing down his spine, rubbing the softness of his stomach between our bodies. The delicate hairs there, his intake of breath when he feels my nails lightly tracing his navel. He’s gorgeous. That want in his eyes, shining and playful.

Want…hunger…oh God.

How much?

I can’t feel the taps anymore, the magic pouring from me, the insides of my veins scorched clean and the feeling is all gone. How can I regulate the quantity coming out of my body with each touch to his?

Holes want to get bigger. Yawning and open and merging. The want never ends, my throat dries up and I feel like I’m choking on sand. My hands freeze. I can’t feel my chest, my hips. I’m creating dead spots, quiet zones on the landscape of my own body. Baz is talking to me. I can’t hear him. The Humdrum. He made Baz hungry once. Baz couldn’t stop. The Mage….he couldn’t stop either, wanted it all or wanted me gone. I killed him. Oh god. I just wanted him to stop.

“They have nothing and they’re drawn to you, the greatest of somethings!”

Baz isn’t touching me anymore; I feel colder than I’ve ever felt. The words won’t make it past my teeth. I’m shaking. There’s nothing to say to him. I’m empty. There’s so much wanting, so much needing, so much so much. I can’t be what he needs, I can’t even feel where the wanting has gone within me, it’s shriveled and hidden. I love him. But I’m terrified of the sucking, drying, pulling sensation within me. I see the woods on fire, I see the damage I can do to his world. I refuse to be the one that drains him dry. Or gives too much and drowns him. I can’t feel it anymore, I can’t know what will happen. I’m not safe. Shut it down Simon. Don’t let it out.

_Sorry, I don't want your touch  
It's not that I don't want you  
Sorry, I can't take your touch_

It was so easy. Once I kissed him the first time, that push off the edge. I fell into Baz, the softness of his mouth, his hands cradling my lower back, the feeling of his thighs beneath me. There was fire around us, but together, we wished it away. Together, we were safe, Baz was alive and I was alive, and we were so close I could feel his heartbeat in my own chest. I was so full, that we equalized, the push and pull like the tides and the moon, a progression of sensations. I understood it then. I liked him beneath me, a shudder running through him when I dragged my lips down his pale neck to the spot below his collar bone. The want in him complemented the wanting in me, fit inside my breath and I nearly cried with the relief of letting it go.

I’d been afraid to give him too much, I’ve always been too much. Expansive power beneath my skin, forever used as a weapon. But what a moment it was when we saw the stars. Even then, I pulled back. I was terrified of overwhelming him with wave after wave of longing that slept beneath, a riptide of feeling that could topple us both. He wants, but I’ve lost track of the tides, I’m a stranger in this sea. _  
  
It's just that I fell in love with a war  
Nobody told me it ended  
And it left a pearl in my head  
And I roll it around  
Every night, just to watch it glow  
Every night, baby, that's where I go_

I hold Baz’s love inside my heart. I let it irritate my lungs, my ribs, rattle it around my stomach, let it drive me mad. I know I can keep that memory safe, if I let the pain continue a bit longer, polish it, hold it there. The pain will be a soft and luminous memory one day, a precious thing. The days he loved me. I can live off these for the rest of time. I sent him away, afraid he’d get a whiff of the sea and come running to soak himself in the surf. I can’t let go now. _  
  
Sorry, I don't want your touch  
It's not that I don't want you  
Sorry, I can't take your touch  
  
_Swords between us, the teasing. It’s familiar and it feels so damn good, we’re just boys again. Baz is quoting Shakespeare at me and I’m laughing. My wings are warm in the sun, the sword feels so right in my hand. I don’t need magic in this moment. It never lasts long enough for me to grasp firmly, and I’ve learned not to try. The faster I try to understand the tides, the quicker I lose my footing. The smile that fades the moment we see the vampires.

The adrenaline of a battle, the fear of losing him right after I felt that connection, it sets my skin on fire. I cannot lose him. That familiar ache is pulled to the surface, I see him running towards the car and I gasp, it has nothing to do with the run and everything to do with gravity. I’m falling. The sand shifts beneath my feet and I’m losing my grip on all the defenses I’ve thrown before me to block his skin from mine. I make a desperate grab for the life raft of his arms and I’m kissing him against the car before I even realize what my body is doing. He’s incredible. He’s everything. He deserves so much more.

_There's a hole that you fill  
You fill, you fill  
_

All that time building up control, learning to share my power. It’s gone now, I stumble through dry patches of barren land, find puddles beneath spiny plants that frighten me away before I can look inside. Where can an ocean hide? I fall through time, fall through space, and I’m drowning in a sea that has no true location within me. Is it an echo? A dream? A wish?

_It's just that I fell in love with a war  
And nobody told me it ended  
And it left a pearl in my head  
And I roll it around  
Every night, just to watch it glow  
Every night, baby, that's where I go  
Just to watch it glow_

I hear the waves crashing, like the blood pulsing in my ears, it rushes back to me when I see him treated like I was. When hands are on him with ill intent, hunger in someone’s eyes that aren’t reflected in his own. Hands patting him down, knowing he won’t move in fear of the lives around him. I know that fear, I feel it every day. Blood rising inside me, it’s almost like the magic I once held. A placebo push, it’s all I need, to echo the explosion I used to be. I’ll tear them apart before someone’s hunger dulls his eyes and hunches his shoulders. Take the anger. Hold it inside with his love, the abrasion of sand and rage and love. It shines out of me. I can make a bomb, if it keeps him safe. It’ll fill the spaces between bullet holes and webbing of my wings. I’ll hold him close and wrap him in everything I am, everything I was, and maybe it’ll be enough. Is there muscle memory for longing? I can hear the waves again, my wings dragging, our bodies dropping, crashing upon the shore.


End file.
